black hearts
by cygnusblack7
Summary: what made the blacks so different? torture, terror, tears. what made narcissa black even more so? laughter, learning, love.
1. when they were young

Chapter One ~ Black Heart

Bellatrix Black had been quite a society jewel when she was young. Pureblood, beautiful, Dark in a way that, back then, was rather alluring, as it became in time for her youngest sister. Andromeda had been very similar in many ways. She looked rather like Bella, and was rather close to her. Perhaps, the old families said to each other over cocktails at high society events, not quite as Dark as dear Bellatrix, but a Black nonetheless. A lovely addition to any family, they smiled, and glanced at those who had unmarried male heirs bitterly or boastfully.

Narcissa was really rather the icing on the proverbial cake for her parents. Three daughters to marry off to young, eligible men, and perhaps Cissa was the most beautiful, but the other two had the look of the Black family, carelessly, elegantly good looking. Rather like Sirius and Regulus.

Narcissa Black was always rather close to Regulus. He was quite close to her age, and funny in a very sarcastic, Slytherin way, rather like herself. Also like herself, he rather embraced darkness - as they all did, Dromeda and Sirius less so, but they were _Blacks_ and so darkness was a part of them.

When Cissa and Reg were both very young, they talked about taking over the world together. "Purebloods in charge," said Reg. "No Mudbloods or Muggles," and Cissa had nodded vigorously because they didn't need scum to step on.

When she was a little bit older, Bella, who she loved lots and lots, as much as Dromeda, got called into their mother's room far more often. Bella could be vicious after those long sessions in there, and sometimes she'd kick the house elves down the stairs.

One of them broke its neck once. Mama had laughed and said something about knives.

Bella went to Hogwarts and got Sorted into Slytherin, and while Mama didn't do anything as silly as gush, she did smile slowly and tell Papa that he could trust her with Bella. After that he had nodded when Bella ripped her room apart at Christmas with a mixture of magic and madness and simply said, "Lovely, Druella."

A couple of years later, when Cissa and Reg were seven and quite grown up really, Mama talked to Andromeda, the same long talks that happened behind closed doors and Cissa and Reg couldn't hear what they said as Bella still had.

The first time, Dromeda had been a little bit off when she came out, until Mama went to bed and then she had screamed once, and Bella had hugged her and said that they were Blacks.

Sirius became, if at all possible, more of a sullen rebel than before, and when he came round, he only talked to Dromeda and sometimes Bella, the three of them shooting little glances at Cissa and Reg in the corner talking about how they couldn't wait to go to Hogwarts as long as they weren't with any Mudbloods. Purebloods had magic, simply. They were better.

Sirius and Dromeda went to Hogwarts the next September, and Cissa and Reg waited eagerly for their letters home. Dromeda's arrived first. She said she was in Slytherin, but Sirius was in Gryffindor. All the Slytherins were really nice but some of the other Houses were awful and prejudiced. Sirius said hi if he passed her in the corridor but Houses didn't really talk. Bella was fine. Cissa had frowned at the letter and her father had taken it, read it, passed it to her mother, let her read it, took it back and threw it in the fire. Then all of them had gone over to Reg and Sirius' house, and the adults had talked over their heads and said it was an Outrage and should they write and demand he be reSorted.

When Dromeda had come home for Christmas, Sirius hadn't come home. He didn't leave Hogwarts all year, and then at the end of the year he had stepped off the train, better-looking and taller and very, very tense. All of the girls in first or second year sighed as he sauntered over, still so tense, and Cissa took his arm and tossed her long hair. Their parents had hustled them off the platform, all of them back at last, Bella, Sirius, Dromeda, Reg and her. She had sighed contentedly. Sirius had stayed in his room for most of the summer, and no matter how many long talks in his Mama's room he got, he never took down the Gryffindor banners and Muggle photographs plastered on his walls.

Dromeda took to spending the time that wasn't in Mama's room in her room. She didn't play with Cissa any more no matter how nicely she asked, and Bella played odd games sometimes now. She laughed at the most obscure things with a note of almost hysteria in her voice, and seconds later she could be collectedly moving through to the dining room and curtsying to a Malfoy or a Greengrass or Parkinson as a demurely Dark little thirteen-year-old, old enough for her parents to be thinking about marriage now. And they did.

While Bella and Dromeda were back at school, Narcissa began to have those talks with her mother. At first it was merely about Pureblood supremacy, and Mudblood filth, until one day Mama had come home from a meeting with a glint in her eye, breathing heavily, and dragged her into her room.

"Do you know what pain is, Cissy?" She had spat at Cissa, who was all of ten years old, who had swallowed and replied with only the slightest quiver in her voice, "It's - it's when you get hurt, isn't it, Mama?" Her mother had laughed in a far more terrifying way than Bella did, and breathed from behind her, "Pain is so much more," with an almost loving twist to her voice, "This is pain, Narcissa Black," and whispered _Crucio_ and she had screamed and collapsed to the floor, shaking with the feeling of red hot pokers tearing her apart, cutting off her limbs and agony searing through her as she thrashed around, still screaming, screaming, screaming, shaking until she was so exhausted she could no longer move.

She had no idea how long it was that she lay there, sobbing brokenly, but when the pain vanished her mother hissed at her to get up and she couldn't. She just twitched and took her ragged breaths in gulps. Mama hauled her up and threw her into her own room, and told her to come down for dinner in half an hour (had it really only been a couple of hours?) and she lay on the floor in her crumpled dress and sobbed because her mother had just tortured her and made it hurt - _you have to really mean it_ \- and pulled herself together and replaced her dress with a dining sort of dress and made her way down the stairs very carefully. Her Papa was home for supper and he looked at the way Cissa wouldn't look at her mother and her hand shook as she lifted her glass to her lips and said to her mother that perhaps she was going soft to have waited so long. She had shrugged elegantly and said he didn't really think that or he'd have taken matters into his own hands.

He had laughed and said she was absolutely right.

When Bella and Sirius and Dromeda had come home over summer, she had learnt not to scream - "be quiet, stupid girl" - and they had stepped off the train and all three had looked at her and Sirius had patted her - and Reg - on the shoulder and Dromeda had hugged her. Bella had waited till they were home before all three of them had held on to one another so, so, tightly because that was all that was left.


	2. the beginning of the magic

Narcissa Black received her Hogwarts letter in early July. She had not squealed, because "overly excessive displays of emotion benefit nobody". Her mother had made her write that out one hundred times after she had sobbed brokenly after a session.

It was cut into her back now.

She and Reg had both grinned, with a kind of relieved sigh, the next time they all had a luncheon; the house elves seemed to be growing ever more fearful of all of them. Especially at Cissa's. Kreacher loved serving the Blacks, and sometimes she thought he had no greater ambition than having his head stuck up on the wall next to his mother's. She'd only told Sirius that.

He'd laughed and ruffled her hair, saying he would try to look out for her at school.

When Narcissa Black was sitting in a compartment on the Hogwarts Express with Dromeda and Bella and Reg, all four of them let out a huge sigh of relief. None of them needed to explain.

The Sorting Hat had yelled out Slytherin, first for her, then for Reg seconds later she couldn't help but smile with relief and look over at Dromeda and Bella sitting ramrod straight in the midst of many green-wearing boys and girls, then to Sirius, sitting with the golden Gryffindors, surrounded by a group of three other boys. Just about every girl below fourth year at any table but Slytherin glanced in his direction at least once during the feast, but he never really acknowledged any of them. He laughed with those darlings of the school, smirking while Dippet made his speech, his arm slung around the messy-haired boy's shoulder.

He only properly looked at her once, right at the end when everyone was standing up and Bella indicated with a nod of her head that the first years should follow her; for a second both of them glanced at the other and he caught her eye and winked.

She felt slightly less petrified.

When all of the Slytherin first years had come into the common room - password _Tenebris -_ one of the seventh years stood up on a chair.

"Right, you lot," she said, looking down at all of them with their straight backs and perfect manners drummed into them by their parents. "Anyone here not a pureblood?" Two children, a boy and a girl, raised their hands tremulously. She raised one eyebrow.

The boy said, "Half blood." His voice was clear and careful, and it was obvious that one of his parents had been a pureblood; the other, perhaps a Mudblood whom they'd fallen in love with. His manners seemed well refined and he would fit in well.

"What about you?" the seventh year demanded, when no answer was forthcoming from the girl. She swallowed and murmured, "Muggleborn."

There was a silence that lasted for a couple of seconds before the seventh year nodded, and looking around the room, said, "You are all going to need to stick together. Everyone despises us except one another. You're Bella's sister, right? And Sirius Black's brother?" Narcissa and Reg looked up and nodded. "Perfect example. Her," she indicated Cissa, "her sisters are Slytherins, she's a Black, and because of the actions of those before her, because she is a Slytherin, she will never once be given a chance to prove herself, never be accepted by anyone outside of Slytherin." Cissa pressed her lips together and swallowed. "His brother is a Gryff. Despite the both of them being born to the same people, both being Blacks, _you_ ," she pointed at Reg, "will not be given a chance. We cannot fail one another, because there is no one else. So, girls, I expect to see all of you together tomorrow at breakfast. Teach her about what she will need to know. The Mudblood is one of us." With that, she turned and stalked off up the left-hand staircase.

Cissa and Reg exchanged a quick glance before he turned off to the right. Cissa wordlessly walked through the archway to her left. When she reached a door reading simply _First Years_ in an elegant script, she turned the ornate handle and walked in. The rest of the girls followed her. She turned and surveyed them all. She knew all the purebloods, of course; Alecto Carrow; Isabella Selwyn; Cassandra Nott; Estelle Rowle; Lydia Greengrass; and Viola Rosier. She looked at the Mudblood.

"What is your name?" Her voice was clear, and it was clear whom she was addressing. The Mudblood looked up. She seemed startled that any one of them had spoken to her, despite the seventh year's warning.

"Um - Sylvia Welle."

Narcissa studied her for a moment. Then she held out her hand. "My name is Narcissa Black." Alecto raised an eyebrow. She knew what Alecto Carrow was thinking; she was one of the ones who'd taken to torture, perhaps too much so; Alecto Carrow and her brother were simply dreadful, and she couldn't see her ever offering her hand to a Mudblood.

Narcissa Black turned and _looked_ at the rest of her roommates.

Lydia Greengrass stepped forward and held out her hand.

Later that night, Cissa was lying in the bed at the end. She'd chosen it; all the purebloods seemed to look to her as a leader, and the Mudblood just did what the rest did for now.

She thought about what the older girl had said. _Never once be given a chance to prove herself, never be accepted._ Her heart sank down to her stomach.

She was almost sure no one else in the room could hear her cry.

The next morning, the seventh year looked at them. They'd put the Mudblood in the middle of the group, and she and Cassandra were talking about her parents.

She nodded at them.

Cissa sat next to Dromeda, and Estelle sat next to her.

"Can you believe, a Mudblood in Slytherin?" Her voice was almost growling. Dromeda raised her eyebrows at the two of them, but didn't comment.

"I know that, Estelle. But there must be a reason. She's pretty normal - of course, I haven't met a Mudblood before, but we must take care of our own. She seems smart enough to learn what's happening. Do you want to be out in the cold, Estelle Rowle?" With that, she turned to Dromeda, who smirked and her and whispered,

"When did you get so smart?"

In her first Transfiguration lesson, she sat down next to the Mudblood. She opened her mouth as if to say something to Cissa, but then both of them were distracted.

Lydia had been about to sit down when some Gryffindor bashed her out of the way. She looked up, confused. Lydia was genuinely a nice person, mostly. She'd done nothing. Both of them could see her waiting for him to apologise.

He sneered at her and said clearly, "Serves you right, snake." Both of them gasped, Cissa more imperceptibly than the Mudblood and he turned to them and laughed.

"Bloody Slytherins."

Narcissa narrowed her eyes.

At that moment, the Professor made his entrance. He looked down at the Gryffindor boy and Lydia and said, "Would you please take a seat, Miss...?"

Lydia swallowed and said quietly, "Greengrass. Lydia Greengrass."

The twinkling light in his eyes was snuffed. He said quietly, "Ah. Why don't you go sit with her? I'm sure a number of people would prefer not to deal with the Greengrass family opinion." He gestured toward Cassandra, and Lydia, after a sharp intake of breath, rushed over to her and dropped her books on the table.

Cissa and the Mudblood - Sylvia, she supposed - exchanged horrified looks.

"My name is Professor Dumbledore. I am the Transfiguration Professor here at Hogwarts. Now, is Mister Abbott here?" A pudgy boy raised his hand and Dumbledore smiled warmly at him.

"Narcissa Black?"

Cissa did not raise her hand. Instead she said clearly, "Present."

Everyone in the classroom flinched at the undisguised derision in her voice. He looked at her over the top of his half-moon spectacles and she sneered the way only one who had been brought up to sneer could.

He made his way down the list, almost imperceptibly sneering at every Slytherin's name, until he reached the last name.

"Sylvia Welle?" He looked up, frowning, clearly about to express his concern for a Mudblood in Slytherin, and Sylvia responded, "Present," with the same tone of voice as Cissa had.

Narcissa Black laughed delightedly. In the ringing silence following Sylvia's declaration, it echoed through the classroom.


End file.
